Here’s something truly awesome: A menu for the Cafe Frankenstein in Laguna Beach with artwork by Burt Shonberg, listed on EBay as Buy It Now for $125. I wrote about Cafe Frankenstein in 2011 when a group of slides was … Continue reading →

This purported “tribute” to the Black Dahlia has been listed on EBay. Who makes this junk? Apparently it’s an outfit appropriately called Dreadful Dolls. Who buys it? For $325? There are some very sick people out there. Oh. It’s from … Continue reading →

A scan of one of the transparencies being offered on EBay. This is from an unidentified Western. A vendor has listed a lot of about 500 transparencies that were owned by a “Hollywood filmmaker.” A bit of research indicates that … Continue reading →

I thought I had seen just about all the Black Dahlia-related items that existed, including the Living Dead Dolls, the Black Dahlia snow globe, etc. But this is a new one on me. Dalia Negra was a series of comic … Continue reading →

Note to millennials: This is an example of a book from a lending library. These were generally small businesses that rented books for pennies a day and specialized in current literature and somewhat racy material that wasn’t available at the … Continue reading →

A copy of Florabel Muir’s 1950 “Headline Happy” has been listed on EBay for $45 or make an offer. Muir was a newspaperwoman in Los Angeles and discusses the usual suspects, including Bugsy Siegel (she describes the murder scene) and … Continue reading →

An undated photo of LAPD officers from SkyscraperCity.com, which reposts images from all over the Internet (including mine), often without acknowledgement. I recently learned that this photo, published in Capt. Art Sjoquist’s “History of the Los Angeles Police Department” as … Continue reading →

Here’s another item that is tangentially related to the Black Dahlia case: A photograph of Gloria Swanson inscribed to Florentine Gardens business manager Mark Hansen. Hansen was a small-time operator of movie theaters and news accounts of the Black Dahlia … Continue reading →

An EBay vendor has listed the pilot wings that belonged to Joseph G. Fickling, Elizabeth Short’s onetime boyfriend. Apparently these items were in a storage unit. The vendor has posted a photo of Fickling’s dog tags (not included in the … Continue reading →

A large lot of Black Dahlia material, including newspaper clippings, several magazines, newspaper photos, etc., has been listed on EBay. Bidding is currently 99 cents but I’m sure it will go much higher before the auction concludes. An unattached front … Continue reading →

Oh dear, oh dear, oh dear. An EBay vendor has listed this hand-colored picture with bids starting at $99.99, stating that…. Well, read it in their own words: AFTER A COUPLE OF WEEKS OF RESEARCH AND COMPARING OTHER ELIZABETH SHORTS … Continue reading →

Someone bought this front page of the Jan. 17, 1947, Los Angeles Examiner, with the story about the identification of Elizabeth Short, for $511.01. Not the entire paper. Just the front page. The seller was Timothy Hughes: Early and Rare … Continue reading →

A spectacular Batchelder tile of a lute player, measuring 14 3/4 by 8 3/4 has been listed on EBay. And here’s the back. It appears that the tile may have never been mounted. The tile is listed as Buy It … Continue reading →

This was supposed to be a quick item linking to The Times piece by Vincent Boucher on Irene Lentz and brief blog posts I did about her years ago. But as I dug into The Times clips about her 1962 … Continue reading →

My grandparents used to have a few of these insult valentines stashed in a drawer. But not this one, which seems as timely as ever. This example is listed on EBay with bids starting at $3. And Happy Valentine’s Day … Continue reading →

An Ebay vendor is selling random issues of the LAPD’s Police Beat magazine from 1962 to 1967, including this issue featuring Chief William H. Parker, presumably honoring Parker after his death in 1966. Bidding starts at $16.95.